By Vassilis Kostoulas
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“It’s Cuba without the sun,” was Emmanuel Macron’s quip when now outgoing French President Francois Hollande first proposed the imposition of a maximum 75-percent tax on the highest income brackets in France.
Despite his acerbic comment, or even because of it, Macron later assumed the economy and finance portfolio in Hollande’s government. He was tapped to succeed Arnaud Montebourg after the latter was summarily cashiered in the wake of his criticism of German policy and what he claimed was Berlin’s obsession with the “dogma of austerity” in the Eurozone.
At the time, his was an appointment of a young generation politician with a stint as an executive banker, and despite being a member of the Socialist Party since the age of 24 — part of a bid to sooth frayed nerves on the part of Berlin and markets in the Eurozone.
In terms of the ever-timely “Greek program”, official Athens avoided the worse, as entailed in a Marine Le Pen victory. Le Pen’s repeated statements on the election stump were wholly negative towards France’s continued participation in the Greek bailout, a prospect that would have also jeopardized the continued participation of other Eurozone members, even the EU as an institutional body. Despite its pros and cons, however, the current bailout (the third memorandum) is the only option on the table.
With the Greek government having “dodged a bullet”, Macron appears ready to continue Paris’ decades-old pro-Greece stance.
However, as with most developments in the Eurozone since the advent of the crisis, no one should expect miracles. Germany remains at the Eurozone’s helm, given its economic size and influence. Secondly, Greece’s problems are real and closely linked with the country’s structural weaknesses, its often creaky institutions and its wholly outdated economic model.
What turned heads in Athens days before the second round of the French presidential election was Macron’s statement that he’s solidly in favor of a Greek debt restructuring, and of course, Greece’s presence in the Eurozone. At second glance, the statement would have merely expressed Macron’s opposition to Grexit, rather than a precursor of any initiative surrounding the country’s debt load.
In terms of numbers, France is Greece’s second largest institutional creditors, a fact that has obvious implications for French taxpayers. At the same time, the basis for relief measures aimed to ensure the Greek debt’s sustainability have already been agreed to, and are set for implementation in the coming years.
However, the renewal of Franco-German co-operation, coupled with the fact that German elections are set for September, create expectations that more clear-cut solutions over the Greek issue may be in the works.
